Pericles, it was worse than that. It was the unintended consequences of poorly thought out government policy that started the rot.

To compete with imports we developed a policy that allowed manufacturers to use up to 50% imported content in their products. Smart engineers discovered that they could import the whole working product, less housing, for less than 50% of the cost. The only problem was the imported works were really inferior.

No problem, our smart Asian suppliers offered to produce the works to our design.

One company who were early in this system manufactured movie, & slide projectors among other things.

They soon had excellent asian projectors, produced to their design, landed for about 20% of their cost of manufacture. They wrapped an excellent locally moulded plastic housing around the thing, & doubled their previous mark up.

However, their export markets dried up, when the Asians exported the new projectors under their own brand.

Next their brand was undercutting our manufacturer, even after paying import duty.

We still had import quotas, that restricted how much imported stuff was allowed. As quota's were reduced, or eliminated our manufacturing stopped. Our markets were too small for economies of scale, as the Asians had the whole US market, & we were too insular to even try that.

In 64 I was supplying 7 companies who produced TV sets, & portable radios. By 69 they were gone.

Percilies,
I’m quite sure there is a total malaise right throughout the country. EG The office of taxation auditors didn’t have a single thing in it that was produced in the country, but this didn’t seem to faze them.

There seems to be two opposing forces that are not working in sync. Private enterprise and government, and I forgot to mention in last post, that the wages and budgets of government employees should be tied to some type of national figure, such as a national productivity figure.

If that national productivity figure goes down, then the wages and budgets of government employees are not increased until the productivity figure comes up again.

This would get government employees and academics more interested in productivity, Australian made products and in exports, which seems to be the last thing of any interest to many current government employees and academics.

Also the training of foreign students may be costing Australia money. We have to compete with other countries in terms of supplying more technologically advanced products. What little technology we have, universities are now teaching that to foreign students who take it back to their own country.

IE We have been training the opposition.

*manufacturing begets other jobs, the flow on effect.*

Yabby>> Manufacturing also costs other jobs. It adds costs to
efficient producers, making them less efficient and less
able to compete globally. So you have a downward spiral.<<

Yabby you can bet that if the job aint there, no employer is paying for a body to fill the space. More jobs, downward spiral, more jobs, downward spiral, sorry I had to say it twice to make sure you had said it once. Lets all stop working and look forward to better times ahead, I'm all for that.

*You're dead on Yabby, but don't forget bureaucracy,*

I fully agree, RawMustard. Some of them can be real little
nazis, when power goes to their ahead. But I have to say,
I took them on a number of times, went over their heads to
their bosses in Canberra. In virtually every case, reason
prevailed and they were put in their place. It was just
all alot of hard work and hassle, however.

*By the time our industry was exposed to the economic reality of the rest of the world, it became obvious that the lifelong featherbedding had rendered it incapable of competing.*

You hit the nail on the head, Pericles. When I first came to
Australia, I was shocked how many companies were managed.
Consumers? Ha! We will just hide behind our tariff barriers,
innovate and invest as little as possible, increase our prices
annually, pay ourselves handsomely and consumers will have to
wear it. Efficient exporters paid the ultimate price, bogged down
by these people.

*Now that's a cheap shot yabby*

Not really Rehctub. I am simply judging by your
past posts, that you don't live on Struggle St, as
many do.

So you are judging all this from your perception, rather
then their's.

But see it this way: If people did have to pay alot more
for clothes, consumer goods and the rest, because of tariffs,
they would have less disposable income to spend at your
butcher shop.

You would be the ultimate loser.

Yabby,
I know of an Australian company that was selling a product to people all around the world through the internet.

But they had more sales to Cameroon than they did to Australia.

So for a while they offered the product to Australians for free, who still wouldn't even look at it.

Why did no Australians want to use it. Because they thought it would be inferior or inefficient, and an imported product would always be better, even if they had to pay money for it.

That is now the pervading mentality.